First probe to orbit a comet. First to land. And first in our hearts this weekend.

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The European Space Agency released this cartoon Friday, showing Rosetta having landed, with Philae nearby. This gallery highlights key images from the mission

ESA

Rosetta was launched on March 2, 2004, aboard an Ariane 5 rocket from French Guiana.

ESA

This image of Mars was acquired on Feb. 24, 2007, at a distance of about 240,000 km from the red planet. This was the one of four planetary gravity-assist flybys by the spacecraft en route to comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

Finally, in late June 2014, the spacecraft closed in on its quarry. Here Rosetta is 86,000 km from the comet.

About three weeks later, about 5,500 km away, the comet's peanut shape started to come into view.

ESA

By August 2014, the comet came into clear view. This "boot"-like image was taken from 285 km away.

ESA

This single frame Rosetta navigation camera image was taken from a distance of 85.7 km on March 14, 2015.

ESA

False-color image showing the smooth Hapi region connecting the head and body of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

ESA

An OSIRIS narrow-angle camera image taken on June 6, 2016, when Rosetta was 22.9 km from the center of Churyumov–Gerasimenko. The scale is 0.40 m/pixel.

ESA/Rosetta/MPS

The Philae lander detached from Rosetta on Nov. 12, 2014. It is shown traveling down to the comet's surface.

ESA

What the Philae lander touchdown was supposed to look like. Alas, it tumbled out of control and was lost...

...until it was found nearly two years later, when an OSIRIS narrow-angle camera image taken on Sept. 2, 2016 spotted it. Philae is located at the far right of the image, just above center.

ESA/Rosetta

A number of Philae’s features can be made out in this image taken by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera image.

ESA/Rosetta

One of the last images taken of the full comet, on Sept. 29, 2016. Rosetta was less than 23km away from the comet.

ESA/Rosetta

Getting closer.

ESA/Rosetta

Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera captured this image during the spacecraft’s final descent, just 5.7km away.

ESA/Rosetta

Rosetta's last image of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, taken shortly before impact, an estimated 20 m above the surface. The resolution is 5mm per pixel.

ESA/Rosetta

One of the last signals seen from Rosetta at the European Space Agency's mission control center, via NASA's 70m tracking station at Madrid, during comet landing.

ESA

And, less than a minute later, the signal was gone. If your eyes are dry.

ESA

Unless Matt Damon becomes stranded on Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko any time soon and needs an emergency means of calling back to Earth, the world will never hear from the Rosetta spacecraft again. But the European vehicle served humanity well since its launch 12 years ago. Rosetta became the first probe to both orbit a comet and deploy a lander to a comet's surface. On Friday morning, the spacecraft joined its small lander, Philae, on the surface of its comet. Once there, it shut down.

Even before the European Space Agency’s Giotto spacecraft came within 600km of the nucleus of Halley’s Comet in 1986, the agency was already thinking about a comet lander as a follow-up mission. After finally launching in 2004, Rosetta took a long time to reach Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. The probe had to make four flybys of inner solar system planets (three around Earth, one around Mars) for gravitational assists, and it traveled nearly eight billion km before descending to rest on the comet Friday. The gallery above captures some of the highlights of the 12-year mission.

Further Reading

From a scientific standpoint, Rosetta confirms that comets are remnants from when the Solar System formed, rather than fragments from later collisions. Comets therefore offer a window to 4.6 billion years ago. The program was a public relations success, too. “As well as being a scientific and technical triumph, the amazing journey of Rosetta and its lander Philae also captured the world’s imagination, engaging new audiences far beyond the science community,” said Mark McCaughrean, ESA’s senior science adviser.

The Rosetta mission was largely successful, although the Philae lander was lost when its securing harpoons failed to fire after it reached the surface. Even after tumbling, the tiny lander still sent back valuable data. And now scientists will spend the next several years interpreting data that Rosetta spent over two years collecting from its comet, including data from the probe’s final moments of descent.